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Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

fortune.com

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Re: Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

#151

Post by rogerrogerr »

shevy-java wrote: post #142

I am not convinced. Teter Piel (don't want to use the other name) kind of purchased a LOT of influence power via lobbyists. One lobbyist is Sebastian Lurz (also not going to use the real name here; the letter "l" is an in-country humourous take on Lüssel, Lasser and so forth - ex-politicians). The superrich buy influence and worsen the situation for the rest of us. This has to stop. The USA is currently under direct…

This refusal to use people’s names comes across as childish and distracts from your intended point.

Re: Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

#152

Post by keybored »

savanaly wrote: post #110
sznio wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought about the same recently, in the context of the Epstein files. You don't become a billionaire by being moral. Each time you don't do something because it's wrong, you lost opportunity to make more money. You start with smaller things, then your standards slide more and more, until you are a billionaire, and you're so corrupt there isn't anything for you to do except make more money. Which makes me wonder, ho…

Can't you also make money by making a good decision that benefits you and another party? I feel like I do this all the time, just on a relatively small scale.

Someone further down[1] talked about how “normal people” don’t realize the problem with Bill Gates and Thiel. But I think it’s rather the tech people here that don’t fully realize it.

> I feel like I do this all the time, just on a relatively small scale.

Yeah, scale. Scale is obviously important.

The road to billions of dollars is built on exploitation.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47138558

Re: Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

#153

Post by mikkupikku »

troosevelt wrote: post #114
sznio wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought about the same recently, in the context of the Epstein files. You don't become a billionaire by being moral. Each time you don't do something because it's wrong, you lost opportunity to make more money. You start with smaller things, then your standards slide more and more, until you are a billionaire, and you're so corrupt there isn't anything for you to do except make more money. Which makes me wonder, ho…

Isn't this kind of Nietzsche's slave morality? I don't, for example, think Phil Knight is an immoral person who intentionally did wrong things, though his company certainly has. You don't just become a billionaire and become corrupt, you have a mindset that justifies what you're doing and you conveniently excuse yourself or are unaware because you're dealing with things outside of your scope because a single person c…

> slave morality

I think if you're saying: "These billionaires are bad because they do bad things, and being so rich makes their capacity for harm much worse."

That's not slave morality, at least not necessarily, because the "doing bad things" can probably be expressed using normal classic values. It becomes slave morality when you abbreviate the above to: "These billionaires are bad because it's bad for anybody to be so rich."

Re: Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

#154

Post by EQmWgw87pw »

pfraze wrote: post #91
EQmWgw87pw wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So someone is evil because they answer questions by thinking through them? There are no questions in the universe that can’t be stopped and pondered over. In fact, it’s dangerous to even suggest that, that’s the exact mechanism that propaganda runs on.

Ah yes, the real danger to the world isn’t a powerful man feeling ambivalent about our survival. The real danger is society using that moment as propaganda. This regarding Thiel, a man who most recently tried to make a “Greta Thunberg is the Antichrist” meme stick.

Hesitating to answer a question that may have nuance is not being “ambivalent”. He literally says “there’s multiple questions implicit here” in response to the question asked of him. I genuinely think people like you making sweeping assumptions about others are way more dangerous. People who refuse to critically think or analyze a situation and jump to conclusions.

Re: Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

#155

Post by EQmWgw87pw »

Spivak wrote: post #97
EQmWgw87pw wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So someone is evil because they answer questions by thinking through them? There are no questions in the universe that can’t be stopped and pondered over. In fact, it’s dangerous to even suggest that, that’s the exact mechanism that propaganda runs on.

Actually evil, no. Forever changed by their enormous wealth which messes you up mentally in a lots of fun unique ways, changes the nature of every relationship you'll have post wealth, and feeds into your ego and all your latent neurosis further and further alienating you from and believing yourself above your fellow man, yes. Evil is just a shorthand.

What you’re saying isn’t necessarily wrong, I just don’t think it adds up cleanly to “evil”. Skipping nuance is bad, I think

Re: Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

#156

Post by zer00eyz »

embedding-shape wrote: post #2

Ah man, just tried to submit this with the title "Discord cuts ties with Peter Thiel-backed SaaS once code tied to US spying found" which is slightly better I think, and fits exactly within 80 characters :) I think the whole "after its code was found tied to U.S. surveillance efforts" part is new and wasn't known before, so feels important to have in the title too. Although most of us probably assumed it was true bef…

> "after its code was found tied to U.S. surveillance efforts" part is new ... Although most of us probably assumed it was true before too.

This makes me feel VERY old.

641A: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A

Retroactive telecom immunity: https://www.eff.org/press/archives/2008/10/17

The government spying on what you do has been old news for 20 years. Snowden should not have been a shocking revelation to any one but it was, and that was 13 years ago.

Its less of a "assumed it was true" and more of a "oh look another one, not shocking".

Re: Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

#157

Post by EQmWgw87pw »

pfraze wrote: post #104
EQmWgw87pw wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m hearing this a lot but never with any substance, would you care to elaborate with a hard action or idea with a direct result?

What are you, Thiel’s alt? The guy backed Facebook, built a mass surveillance firm, and talks about democracy as an obstacle. How do you expect people to feel about him?

I would not advocate against democracy. But do you believe it is flawless?

Re: Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

#158

Post by bsza »

SpaceManNabs wrote: post #111
bsza wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would have agreed 5 years ago, but not this day and age, when AI is raping open source projects and killing platforms like Stack Overflow. We need a safe space from web crawlers and surveillance, and open forums ain't it. (Neither is Discord, but a sufficiently secure alternative might be.)

AI is what??

https://www.pcmag.com/news/godot-game-engine-is-drowning-in-...

https://arstechnica.com/security/2026/01/overrun-with-ai-slo...

https://www.phoronix.com/news/LLVM-Human-In-The-Loop

https://theshamblog.com/an-ai-agent-published-a-hit-piece-on...

Just off the top of my head, I bet a lot of other repos are going through the same.

Re: Discord cuts ties with identity verification software, Persona

#160

Post by [deleted] »

rogerrogerr wrote: post #151
shevy-java wrote: post #142

I am not convinced. Teter Piel (don't want to use the other name) kind of purchased a LOT of influence power via lobbyists. One lobbyist is Sebastian Lurz (also not going to use the real name here; the letter "l" is an in-country humourous take on Lüssel, Lasser and so forth - ex-politicians). The superrich buy influence and worsen the situation for the rest of us. This has to stop. The USA is currently under direct…

This refusal to use people’s names comes across as childish and distracts from your intended point.

[deleted]
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